


Losing Hope

by ChildishFluff



Series: Three Littles, Two Caregivers, and So Many Wars [4]
Category: Dream SMP - Fandom
Genre: Age Regression/De-Aging, CG!Quackity, CG-ish!Tubbo, Little!Karl, Little!Tommy, Non-Sexual Age Play, hurt kinda comfort, this is agere angst like real angst do not read if small
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-03
Updated: 2021-01-03
Packaged: 2021-03-13 20:34:09
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,040
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28534476
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ChildishFluff/pseuds/ChildishFluff
Summary: Before the election, his headspace was usually full of fun and cuddles, and the worst thing to happen was being scolded or punished for rule breaking. Here and there, there were petty fights amongst the littles, but they never lasted long.Now, he was lucky if he was able to regress for half an hour without thinking of his friends and bursting into tears. Wilbur snapped at him more, and Tubbo was around less. It was like someone took his picture-perfect happy life and smashed it with a hammer called 'politics'.The Election ruined everything. And Tommy was losing any hope he had about fixing the picture frame that held his happy memories.--This is non-sexual, sfw age regression, dni if you're nsfw/abdl/ageplay/cgl/ect. If any of the creators included in this work say *anything* about being uncomfy with fan fiction/of agere content including them, I will take this down and/or modify it appropriately. If they have already said something that I'm unaware of, please let me know.
Relationships: Karl Jacobs & TommyInnit, Toby Smith | Tubbo & TommyInnit, Toby Smith | Tubbo & Wilbur Soot, Wilbur Soot & TommyInnit
Series: Three Littles, Two Caregivers, and So Many Wars [4]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2082096
Comments: 11
Kudos: 236





	Losing Hope

**Author's Note:**

> This takes place in the same universe as 'three littles, two stacks of tnt, and a boring day', 'compromise', and 'toy swords and timeout'. Basically, all those took place before the election, and this is after, showing how the conflict between Quackity and Wilbur affected everyone. This honestly is really sad and angsty, and it focuses more on Tommy's thought process and emotions then the actual events in the story.  
> Please please please read with caution, because people have told me that my purposefully-angsty writing has the ability to make them genuinely sad/cry. Wilbur and Quackity are lowkey not very good caregivers in this, and this whole thing is just in my much sadder writing style.

Tommy and Tubbo hadn't seen Karl in weeks. 

Wilbur wouldn't let them. Not since they lost the election to Quackity and Schlatt. Tubbo was aloud in L'manburg, but he didn't talk to his old friend or Quackity anymore. 

It was so weird, how quickly the whole 'president' thing pulled their little group apart. Things were tense between Quackity and Wilbur since the former had announced that he was running, but they didn't let their differences affect the boy's friendship. Things didn't change drastically until Wilbur and Tommy were sent away and kicked out of L'maburg.

"C-can you tell Karl that I said hi?" Tommy stumbled over his words a bit, speaking in a nervous tone to Tubbo. They sat in the caves of Pogtopia, sitting with their backs against stone as Wilbur mined, placing any significant material in a box.

"You can't," Wilbur interrupted, pausing his work temporarily. "He'll know you have contact with us and we'll get found." he told Tubbo.

"Oh," Tommy said. Wilbur seemed so different now. He was much stricter on both boys, and always caught up in work. Not only could Tommy not see one of his friends, but it felt like his caregiver was gone too. "I-i miss him." he said, pout clear on his face. He wasn't little quite yet, but it was easy to tell that he was close to slipping. Tubbo was big too. He felt like he had to be big so much more often now. He had to sneak around to see his caregiver, it was much harder to try and regress comfortably now. 

Really, the three littles had all had issues regressing since the election split them apart. Nothing felt quite right, or okay. They were lonely, and sad, and just upset. And it only seemed that things were getting worse as time went on.

"He's on the opposite side, Tommy. He isn't a friend," Wilbur told him. Tommy pulled his knees to his chest, his eyes tearing up a bit. "Neither is Quackity, we don't care about them anymore." 

"I do!" Tommy cried out in frustration, earning a look from Wilbur. "Sorry for shoutin'," he apologized. He blinked, sniffling a little. "I still miss dem." he repeated, much more quietly.

Meanwhile, Tubbo seemed pretty mad at Wilbur. He was glaring in his direction. "They might be on 'the other side', but they were our friends and the only thing that split us all up was a election you tried to cheat." he said. "You can't just tell Tommy not to care about them." 

Tommy stared at the bridges, zoning out of the fighting. Nothing felt right. Everything felt broken. His friendships, his ability to regress, life. 

_His caregiver._

He wanted to go back to playing in L'manburg, and having imaginary wars. Not real ones. He wanted to go back to pretending to be annoyed when Tubbo interrupted his games and schemes and rule breaking to plop a flower crown on his head, or to ask to hold his hand because he was scared of something and trusted Tommy the most. 

He wanted to go back to being happy. Because he wasn't happy right now. 

He seemed to come back to reality when he noticed shouting. When had Tubbo and Wilbur started arguing? Why were they yelling? Tommy didn't like yelling. He cried silently, trying to block out what they were saying. He rocked in place, bringing his thumb to his lips and trying to make himself calm down. 

But the yelling hurt his ears and all the emotions felt so overwhelming. For the first time in a while, he was impurely regressing. Before the election, his headspace was usually full of fun and cuddles, and the worst thing to happen was being scolded or punished for rule breaking. Here and there, there were petty fights amongst the littles, but they never lasted long. 

Now, he was lucky if he was able to regress for half an hour without thinking of his friends and bursting into tears. Wilbur snapped at him more, and Tubbo was around less. It was like someone took his picture-perfect happy life and smashed it with a hammer called 'politics'. 

"Shut up, shut up, shut up!" he slapped his hands over his ears, shouting as loud as he could manage, interrupting the other two's argument. Wilbur immediately went to comfort him, forgetting about whatever he had been saying to Tubbo and dropping to Tommy's side. 

"Hey, buddy, I'm right here," he started, trying to reach out to hug him. Whenever Tommy was upset, Wilbur could calm him with a hug. His embrace always made Tommy feel more comfortable. 

But Tommy shuffled away from him, pushing him away when he tried to get closer. 

"Y-you don't want a hug?" Wilbur stuttered, shocked and confused by his actions. He really hoped that Tommy's next words weren't 'not from you'. But that might as well be what he said. 

As Tommy looked past his caregiver, making grabby hands for his friend, Wilbur's heart broke. Tubbo gave Wilbur a sympathetic glance, that was a lot closer to pity then anything. 

"Come on, Toms," Tubbo said, coming over to him and taking his hand. He wasn't as strong as Wilbur, he couldn't carry him. "Would you like to stay here with Wilbur, or do you me to take you somewhere?" 

In response, Tommy clutched onto Tubbo's shirt. "Go wif you," he mumbled, avoiding looking at Wilbur. 

"You can't take him," Wilbur said. Tubbo stared him down. 

"Yes, I can." he corrected. 

"No, I'm his caregiver. You can't take him if I say you can't." 

Tubbo sighed, looking to Tommy. "Hey, buddy? Can you please be big for a moment?" 

Wilbur only had power over Tommy when he was little. Otherwise, he was in charge of himself. If Big Tommy told him that he wanted to go with Tubbo, Wilbur couldn't pull the 'caregiver' card. Tommy nodded a bit, staring at the ground and taking a few deep breaths before speaking up. 

"I want to go with Tubbo, Will." Tommy said, "I-i'll come back later. You're stressed out and upset and you're making me feel the same way because of how you're acting." 

Wilbur didn't know what to say, his mouth agape as he tried to think. But before he even got another word out, Tubbo was helping Tommy up the bridges and out of Pogtopia. Wilbur backed up until he felt the stone against his back, sliding down until he was sitting. 

He pulled his knees to his chest, just like his harshness had caused Tommy to do just a bit ago, and he cried. He had managed to push both big and little Tommy away from him. 

No matter how mad Big Tommy would get at Wilbur, he'd always turn to him when he regressed. But now, the older man had managed to even screw that up. _Was_ there a way to fix this? 

\--

"Tommy!" 

The, once again, regressed little was pulled into his friends arms immediately when Karl and Quackity met up with them. They were away from the rest of the SMP, where no one would find them. Tommy fell into his arms, feeling comforted by Karl's touch. It couldn't fix everything, but it did help him. 

Eventually, the two boys ran off to just chill somewhere, talking about everything besides their real problems because they needed to get away from them. Even if only for a little while. Even if their problems surrounded them completely, and they both felt helpless, not knowing what to do. 

"Where has he been?" Quackity asked, watching the boys play at the edge of the lake they had decided on. "And how do you know? Are you working with them?" 

"Yes, yes, don't tell Jschlatt. And I can't tell you where they've been, just in case you do," Tubbo sighed, his arms crossed. "For now, can you forget about the whole enemy thing with Wilbur and just help me take care of Tommy. He needs it." 

"He has someone to take care of him," Quackity replied. 

"He doesn't _want_ Wilbur. He's just as miserable as you are," Tubbo sniped. At that, Quackity softened his face, nodding a bit. Tubbo was right, they needed to drop the politics for now.

"O-okay. Just for now, forget about the election." he agreed. "We can't take him to any of our bases, he'll get caught. We'll have to get up here, do something until he's big.." 

"And then I'll take him back to talk with Wilbur." Tubbo added. He was not looking forward to that part, he was sure it wouldn't go well on any end. He could only hope for the best.

"I'll come with you," Quackity decided. This earned a confused glance from Tubbo. "Karl's been miserable without seeing you two. This is the first time he's regressed in a week, at least." he sighed. 

"Whatever happens, me and Wilbur need to get to some sort of point where we can be nice enough to let you guys see each other." 

_"Definitely. We need to figure something out."_

Quackity and Tubbo watched the boys play until Tommy started panicking, wanting to see Wilbur. Tubbo sat him down and talked to him calmly until he managed to pull himself out of his panicked state, and also littlespace. Then, the group went vaguely near Pogtopia, where Tubbo left them to go retrieve Wilbur. 

They tried to fix things, they really did. But it seemed that that'd be complicated and difficult. It was questionable that they'd be able to. Things wouldn't even begin to reach normalcy until they got L'manburg back, and Tubbo took over, and Wilbur died and his personality changed completely. 

_Tommy was losing hope._

This whole ride would continue to be really emotional for all three of the littles. And then Tommy would get exiled, _by Tubbo,_ making everything a million times worse. No matter how much they tried to fix things, it seemed that they just made it worse. It seemed that for every step back towards the happiness they once had, there was a car that picked them up and drove them miles in the wrong direction. 

The once happy and heartwarming friendship between the boys, the 'little trio', was now a faded memory amongst war, emotions, and exile. Happy little playdates, and the days of running around L'manburg with flower crowns and plastic swords seemed like something that they'd never get back. 

Tommy missed when his biggest worry was getting put on the timeout step. It was like he was suddenly forced to grow up, and face reality, and he hated it. He just wanted to go back to being a kid most of the time, just because it made him happy. But he couldn't, not anymore. 

Most of the time, stories start off sad, full of conflict and complicated relationships. And then you get to the happy ending, when the problem was solved and everyone was on good terms with each other. 

It seemed that Tommy's life got things a bit mixed up. He _was_ happy, and _then_ the conflict and complicated relationships came in. He wanted a happy ending, or just a way to return to how life was before, but it seemed that he couldn't go anywhere good from here. It seemed that _this_ was the end of his story. 

At least he had Techno now. His other brother, when the one he had relied on before died and left him alone. At least he had a home, at least there seemed to be a bit of hope. Maybe, this wasn't the end. 

Things would never be the same, between him, Tubbo, and Karl. But maybe he could get back on good terms with them. Maybe, staying with Techno would give him a chance at getting back to where he was. Maybe, this was the start to a new story. 

Maybe, there'd be a sequel, something better then the fortune he was sentenced to by Tubbo's exile. Maybe, just maybe, there'd be another chapter where apologies were given and everything was fixed. Maybe, there was a way to reverse the effects of the election, and all the events that followed. 

_All Tommy could do was hope._

**Author's Note:**

> I hope y'all enjoyed, despite how sad this whole thing was. Lmk if you have requests/predictions on where this whole thing is going, if you think I'll be able to reverse all this damage somehow. Also leave feedback as well, that always helps me!  
> I don't really write angsty agere stuff past the typical 'character is little and thinks their cg is mad at them' or just a little experiencing anxiety/regressing due to stress, so this is kinda new to me, y'know? Let me know how I did!


End file.
